Study Reveals Opioid Patients Face Multiple Barriers to Treatment

July 20, 2018

“In areas of the country disproportionately affected by the opioid crisis, treatment programs are less likely to accept patients paying through insurance of any type or accept pregnant women, a new Vanderbilt study found.

Vanderbilt researchers focused on four Appalachian states — Tennessee, Kentucky, North Carolina and West Virginia — that have among the highest rates of opioid use in the country and are more affected by opioid overdose deaths. In their study published in the journal Substance Abuse, researchers found that only about 50 percent of opioid treatment providers took any insurance, and there was also a huge variance among the states in programs that accepted Medicaid.

While 83 percent of treatment programs in West Virginia accepted Medicaid insurance, only about 13 percent of programs in Tennessee accepted Medicaid. Additionally, the study found that while 91 percent of programs were accepting new patients, only 53 percent of outpatient buprenorphine programs would treat pregnant women.”Read more at: http://news.vumc.org/2018/07/12/opioid-patients-barriers-treatment/